Church Fenton in North Yorkshire and Wattisham in Suffolk recorded 16cm of snow, while up to 15cm was forecast for parts of Cumbria, Lincolnshire, East Anglia, North Yorkshire, the Peak District and the Midlands.

A third of today's flights have been axed at Heathrow Airport amid adverse weather conditions and the possibility of freezing fog.

A Heathrow spokesman said: "We have about 850 of our usual 1,231 flights scheduled for today.

"That's been agreed with the airlines, but we are asking people to check with their airlines before travelling to the airport."

350 flights – a third of the day's total – were called off at the airport on Saturday even before the forecast snow began.

A full schedule of flights is planned for Gatwick Airport, but passengers were warned of possible disruptions because of the weather.

Stansted, Birmingham, Luton and Manchester airports were forced to suspend operations for a period last night as snow piled up on the runways, but normal service was expected to resume today.

On the roads, motorists faced what the RAC described as a "dangerous cocktail of driving conditions" and were urged to stay at home where possible. Some minor routes closed altogether.

Thames Valley Police said the snow caused a tailback between junctions nine and four southbound on the M40 from about 9pm until the early hours of today.

Drivers on sections of the M25 in Hertfordshire were trapped in gridlock throughout the night.

On Saturday, Prime Minister David Cameron was briefed on the weather situation by Government emergency planners, while councils said they had called in extra staff to cope.

Saturday saw the ice stretch across much of Britain, with skating on the Fens, ice-climbing on waterfalls in the Brecon Beacons, and the Penines blanketed in snow.

The sea froze off Dorset, and rivers and canals up and down the country were covered in ice as the temperature stayed below freezing point all day.

The sudden cold snap is forecast to end on Tuesday – but not before bringing disruption.

Gritters have been out in force since the cold snap began on Monday and were out again last night clearing snow from major routes.

On Saturday night tube services were suspended across most of London as heavy snowfall hit the capital. Stansted airport in Essex and Birmingham airport also had to close temporarily to clear snow.

But worst affected were tens of thousands of people caught up today in the cancellations at Heathrow, used by 180,000 passengers every day.

Its owner, BAA, grounded many short-haul flights to domestic and European destinations in an attempt to let long-haul routes be served without disruption.

BAA had been criticised when heavy snow crippled Heathrow for four days in December 2010 and invested £36m in extra snow and ice clearing equipment but said the cancellations today were critical to its "resilience" plans.

The airport said it needs to reduce take-offs and landings in order to ensure safety in foggy conditions and to clear snow from the stands and runways.

It argues that others airports have more leeway to keep planes running in times of severe weather because they do not operate at full capacity.

A spokesman for BAA said last night: "The severe weather being forecast will reduce the capacity of the airport and without reductions to the flight schedule there would be significant disruption to flights and passengers at Heathrow.

"We have to do this because we are at 99 per cent capacity. When other airports get heavy snow they have slack in the system which allows them to clear any backlog of delays."

The Heathrow cancellations are in contrast to Moscow Airport where – despite snow and freezing conditions – there were no plans to cancel flights today.

The cancellations were met with anger by some passengers, with one joking on Twitter: "Heathrow spokesman on flight cancellations, 'Well we didn't think there would be a winter this year'".

Gatwick airport warned passengers to expect some disruption but did not order cancellations.

The Department for Transport maintained it was now better prepared than ever for severe winter weather. It said salt stocks stood at more than 2.4 million tonnes – a million more than last year.

The Local Government Association said council staff and volunteers would be at work to make sure vulnerable people were cared for, and residents were being encouraged to call in on elderly neighbours.

The coldest temperature recorded in Britain on Friday night was 9.48F (-12.4C) in South Newington, Oxfordshire – making it the coldest night of the winter so far.

Billy Payne, a forecaster with MeteoGroup, said: "There will be some significant accumulations of snow quite widely across much of England. Away from the South West and across eastern parts of Scotland we are looking at 1.9 inches to 3.9 inches of snow in many areas."

Although it will remain cold over most of Britain, rain will replace snow on Monday, becoming more widespread on Tuesday and Wednesday.

A string of football matches fell victim, with Portsmouth's home match against Hull City cancelled due to a frozen pitch and several matches in the lower leagues called off.

Racing was also heavily hit, with the meeting at Ffos Las scrapped while today's meeting at Kempton will be subject to an inspection.

A 35-year-old woman was taken to hospital with hypothermia after being rescued from a frozen lake. Fire crews had to pull her to safety after she was seen walking on the lake near the Attenborough Nature Reserve on Saturday evening.

Figures showed sales of men's gloves, scarves and hats tripled, with women buying twice as many as usual of these items. Sainsbury's also reported a rise in sales of de-icer, scrapers and shovels and a 24 per cent increase in sales of cold and flu remedies.

The cold snap has spread from eastern Europe. More than 220 people have died across the continent as a result of the cold snap, with Ukraine bearing the heaviest toll of 122 dead, including many who simply froze in the street